I have asked Jacques-Louis de Beaulieu, Joel Guiot, and Rachid Cheddadi to describe the European Pollen Database in some detail, and their material helps us see Human factors that come to play when people's data are to be shared.
Owen K. Davis has a questionnaire on how we all work with data. He is doing a chapter on this topic, and I hope all the readers will xerox the response page, fill it out, and send it to him.
Pierre A. Zippi has obliged me by sending material about his programs designed for the Macintosh. A number of those in my department use his programs and like them. Bent Odgaard provides some very good tips for working efficiently with TILIA·GRAPH. Dr. Triage is back for a second stint, and I describe DEP-AGE for getting sedimentation rates.
After Newsletter #6 was mailed last summer, I sent a statement to Brigitta Ammann to recover a couple of hundred dollars for paper, printing, and postage. A few weeks later I received a phone call from the New York offices of Credit Suisse. The voice on the phone said: "Mr. Maher, yesterday we mailed you a check for $12,837.68." I gasped involuntarily, but I quickly recovered. Undoubtedly the INQUA Holocene Commission was merely expressing its complete satisfaction with the Newsletter. The voice went on however; "We have stopped the check and issued a new one for the correct amount. Please return the stopped check to our office." Well, it was a great feeling for the moment it lasted.
I ask the readers of the Newsletter to send me information on any of the data-handling techniques that you have used which could be helpful to others.
Please check your regular and e-mail addresses for accuracy. Send any corrections or suggestions to:
Louis J. Maher, Jr.
Department of Geology & Geophysics
University of Wisconsin
1215 W. Dayton Street
Madison, WI 53706
USA
Phone: (608) 262-9595 FAX: (608) 262-0693
E-mail: maher@geology.wisc.edu